16 October 2017

Topics

  • The Persian War
  • Technology of ancient Greek warfare
  • Athenian supremacy
  • The Peloponnesian War
  • Spartan supremacy
  • Theban hegemony and the Second Athenian Empire

Winged bas-relief (left and center) and the tomb of Cyrus, in the royal city of Pasargadae, the first capital of the Persian Empire and a UNESCO World Heritage Site

Cyrus the Great

  • Lived c.600-530 BC, founded of the Achaemenid Empire
    • From 559 BC he rulied as a vassal of the Medes, another Iranian peoples
    • Cyrus overthrew Astyages, the last Median king, c. 550, and conquered several semi-inependent peoples to the east, including Baktria and Sogdia, reaching the Indus river
    • Defeated and captured Croesus, king of Lydia, in 547/6
    • Conquered the Neo-Babylonian Empire in 539
  • Lydia had annexed several Ionian cities in the early 6th century, and they now became part of the Achaemenid Empire

Persian Expansion

  • Cyrus' son, Cambyses II (530-522) conquered Egypt
    • Except for the period 404-342 Egypt was thenceforth a Persian satrapy
  • Darius I (522-486) consolidated Persian rule and expanded the borders to their greatest extent
    • Campagned into central Asia and the Indus basin
    • Put down a major revolt in Babylon (522)
    • Adopted Aramaic as the language of government
    • Attacked the Scythians in the eastern Balkans (513) campaigning into modern Ukraine, adding Thrace to the empire while Macedonia submitted voluntarily

Ionian Revolt (499-493)

  • Simultaneous revolts by Greek cities in Ionia, Aeolia, Doria, Cyprus, and Caria which tried to reassert their independence
    • Persians had imposed tyrants to rule the cities, the rebels often installed "democracy"
    • Started in cities of Miletus and Ephesus
  • Allied army of Ionians, Athenians, and Eritreans sacked Sardis (the seat of the local satrap) in 498
    • Although the revolt spread to other cities, thereafter the rebeles were on the defensive
  • Although ultimately defeated, the Persians adopted concilatory policies (lightening tax burdens, allowing local democracies)
  • However, ruling only half of the Greek world was clearly an unstable arrangement

First Persian Invasion (492-490)

  • The Persians reasserted control over Thrace and Macedonia in 492, crossing the Bosporus
    • Fleet was wrecked in a storm rounding Mt. Athos, preventing campaigning southward
    • Ambassadors were sent demanding submission from the Greek cities (symbolized by earth and water)
    • Many cities accepted, but Athens and Sparta killed the ambassadors
  • In 490, the launched a naval attack across the Aegean, sacking Naxos, capturing and razing Eretria, and then cross to Attica, landing in the bay of Marathon on Attica's east coast

  • Athens had requested assistance from Sparta, but they refused to leave home yet, leaving Athens alone but for a contingent from the small allied city of Plataea
  • At Marathon, after a few days of stalemate, the outnumbered Athenians decided to attack, charging down-hill and enveloping the Persians
  • According to Herodotus, 6400 Persians died to 192 Athenians and 11 Plataeans
  • A naval victory by the Athenians immediately afterward ended the campaign

Preparation for a second invasion

  • Preparations for follow- up campaign were slowed by a revolt in Egypt in 486 and Darius' death. He was succeeded by his son Xerxes (486-465)
  • Unlike the first attack, this invasion was massive, though estimates for size vary greatly:
    • Herodotus: 2.5 million men, 1200 warships and 3000 transports
    • Ctesias (early C4 BC): 800,000
    • Modern estimates: 300,000-500,000, around 600 ships
  • Two pontoon bridges across the Hellespont (Dardanelles, the narrowest point today is about 1.4 km) each consisting of over 300 ships
  • Canal across the isthmus of Mt. Athos (found by modern archaeological survey)

Major Engagements I

  • The land-battle at Thermopylae occurred simultaneously with a nearby naval battle at Artemisium in August (?) 480
    • Leonidas I, dual-king of Sparta, led his bodyguard and a small contingent of allied hoplites (300 Spartans, 700 Thespians, 400 Thebians) in a doomed defense of the pass
    • An allied Greek fleet (principally Athenians led by Themistocles) held off the larger Persian fleet, but withdrew when news of the loss at Thermopylae reached them
  • The losses exposed Boetia and Attica to invasion – the next choke-pint was the isthmus at Corinth. Most of Boetia submitted, while Athenians evacuated the city to Salamis, an island immeiately off the coast
    • Naval supremacy necessary for defense at the isthmus, and Athens' navy was the largest by far

Major Engagements II

  • An oracle from Delphi had predicted that Athens' wooden wall would hold
    • Defence of the Acropolis of Athens, defeated, Athens burned
    • The allied fleets, under the nominal command of the Spartan Eurybiades, regroupped at Salamis
    • Athenians threatened to sail westward rather than let their citizens be captured
  • The fleets met at the Battle of Salamis in September (?) 480. The Persians were lured into the straights separating the island from the mainland, negating their numerical superiority.
    • Defeated, Xerxes withdrew to Persia, leaving much of the army to over-winter in Europe

Major Engagements III

  • In the spring, Persians under Mardonius again took Athens. Athenians threatened to quit the alliance if the Peloponnesians didn't attack
    • They eventually did, and the Persians withdrew to Boetia
  • The armies met near Plataea. The allied city-states, led by the Spartan Pausanias. The Greeks won a decisive victory here in August, followed shortly thereafter by a decisive naval victory at Mycale in Ionia

After victory

  • After Plataea and Mycale, the Greek cities of Asia Minor again revolted, and the Greek allies went on the attack
    • Spartans believed the original goals of the war fulfilled, while Athenians believed further warfare would be necessary to gurantee Ionian cities' independence
    • Athens and the newly-liberated cities formed that Delian League, an alliance seeking to organize for future conflict against Persia
  • Throughout the 470s, the Delian league campaigned against Persia, winning a decisive victory at Eurymedon in 469 or 466
    • The Delian league also supported a revolt in Egypt in the 460s, which ended disastrously
    • A truce between the Delian league and Persia was finally agreed after one (of many) failed attempts to liberate Cyprus in 451, ending the "Persian Wars"

The Hoplite

  • Name derived from their heavy round convex wooden sheild, the hoplon (also called an aspis)
    • Pprox. 3' diameter, 16 lbs, 1-1.5" thick
    • "By another [unnamed Spartan woman], as she handed her son his shield, exhorted him saying, 'Either this or upon this.'" From Ploutarch's Moralia, III.18 "Sayings of Spartan Women" LCL III p. 465.
  • Other equipment included body armor bronze helmet, cuirass (bronze or linothorax, greaves, iron-tipped spear (doru, approx. 8'), and short-swort (xiphos)
    • Armament was personal property
  • Limited use of cavalry: expense; unsuitable geography; social norms

Battle scene from 300 (2006 film)

So much cool, so much no

A hoplite battle on the upper frieze on Chingi Vase, C7 BC

  • Organization and discipline were the key features of hoplite battle
    • Cooperation enforced by equipment; half your protection came from your neighbour to the right
    • Battles were a shoving match between sides; whichever broke first, lost
  • Battle-lines were typically 8 ranks deep
    • Better-equpped soldiers to the front
    • Those in the back assisted in the pushing contest, dispatched fallen enemies

A hoplite battle-line

Evolution of equipment from the Persian Wars (left) to the period of Alexander the Great (right)

The Trireme

  • Following the Battle of Marathon, Athens began investing heavily in its navy.
    • In 480, the Athenian fleet included over 200 new triremes. By 420, the fleet size had increased to 350
  • Although they had sails, propulsion was principally from rowers
    • The Olympias, a reconstructed trireme, can sustain 4 kmph, reach a "burst" speed of 18kmph, and turn 180 degrees in under a minute in less than 2.5 ship-lengths with an inexperienced volunteer crew
    • A typical crew comprised 170 rowers, 15 deck hands, 10 marines, a floutist to keep time, and officers
    • Athenian rowers were drawn from the city's poor, but they were citizens not slaves
  • The main weapon was the bronze-tipped ram

A kylix from Vulci depicting a bireme and merchant ships, circa 500 BC

The configuration of rowers (right) and the battle of Salamis, 480 BC (right)

The Olympias, launched in 1987

The Peloponnesian League

  • Formed in the late 7th century against Argos, Sparta's principal competetor for leadership in the peninsula, the league eventually included most of the Peloponessos except Argos and Achaea
  • The league functioned as a series of alliances with Sparta, which exercised veto power over the decisions of the rest of the member states
  • The league supported oligarchies, opposed tyrannies and democracies

The Athenian Empire

  • A few early attempts were made to leave the Dealian league: Naxos in 471, Thasos in 465. Unsuccessful revolts had their walls torn down, their lands seized, and were forced to pay tribute
  • The First Peloponnesian War (460-445) marked the transition from league to empire
    • Athens rebuilt its walls, destroyed during the Persian occupation, and added the "Long Wall"
    • In 451, Pericles moved the League's treasure to Athens
  • The war was inconclusive, and ended with a "30 years' peace" (which only lasted 445-431)

Pericles

  • Lived c.495-429 BC, a wealthy aristocrat famed for his populist politics
  • His political career began in the early 460s, first by ousting Cimon in 461, who had ostracised Themistocles in 472 or 471
  • He led Athens as a leading citizen and as one of the annually-elected strategoi
    • He was a skilled field commander, a talented oratician and politician, and a patron of arts in the city
    • Comissioned Aeschylus' The Persians in 472
    • Credited with rebuilding the Acropolis starting 449

Second Peloponnesian War

  • Archidaimian War (431-421)
    • Strategic stalemate
  • Peace of Nicias (421-414)
    • Both sides jockeyed for new allies
  • Sicilian Expedition (415-413)
    • Athens lost the whole expeditionary force and much of the navy
  • Renewed warfare (414-404)
    • Persia allied with Sparta in 411, challenging Athens at sea
    • A series of revolutions and counter-revolutions in Athens
    • Athens had to tear down its walls and be governed by 30 Spartan-appointed Tyrants, but they were overthrown and democracy again restored in 403

Alcibiades

  • Lived c.450-404, a relative of Pericles and Socrates' most controversial student. A talented general and polarizing figure, he lacked Pericles' political acumen
    • 415: a major proponent of the Sicilian expedition, but he was accused of mutilating the herms in Athens on the eve of departure. Concemned to death in absentia that year
    • Defected to Sparta
    • 412: Had an affair with the Spartan King's wife, defected to Persia
    • 411: supported Athenian democrats against an oligarchic coup, rehabilitated as Athenian general, winning a string of victories 410-407
    • 406: after a costly defeat at Notium, he went into self-imposed exile; assassinated in 404

The Fourth Century

  • Spartan hegemony barely lasted a decade until an alliance of Athens, Argos, Corinth, and Thebes challenged it in the Corinthian War (395-387)
    • Persian control reasserted over the Asian Greek cities, and would rule them until Alexander's campaigns
    • Athens began rebuilding its (second) empire (378-355)
  • The Boetian War (378-372) saw Thebes emerge as the regional hegemon (371-346)
    • Sparta was decisively defeated in the Battle of Leuctra (371) and the Battle of Mantinea (362)
    • The cities of the Peloponnesos were liberated, particularly the helots of Messenia, gutting the Spartan economy and creating several powerful, intractable enemies on Sparta's borders

Written Sources other than Herodotus and Thucydides?

  • Aeschylus, The Persians (472)
  • Aristophanes, Lysistrata (411)
  • Xenophon, Anabasis, Cyranopaedia, Hellenica, and The Polity of the Athenians and of the Lacedaemonians
  • Diodorus Siculus, Bibliotheca historica (1st century BC)
  • Plutarch, Parallel Lives, Moralia, and On the Malice of Herodotus

Other Sources

Secondary literature

  • P. Connolly, Greece and Rome at War, Revised edition, Greenhill Books, 1998
  • Osprey Military History
  • Donald Kagan

Games

  • Civilization series
  • Rome: Total War (2004) and Total War: Rome II (2013)
    • Medieval II: Total War (2006) with Europa Barbarorum 2 mod
  • Europa Universalis: Rome (2008)